


less than

by distantsun



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe, Ambiguous Colemance, Angst, F/M, Spirit!Cole
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-22
Updated: 2015-04-22
Packaged: 2018-03-25 04:53:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3797443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/distantsun/pseuds/distantsun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Inquisitor chooses the spirit path for Cole. It is a mistake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	less than

She knew she’d made a mistake.

Looking back, it should never have been her decision to make at all. But Cole had been so frantic, those feverish blue eyes begging her for an end to his turmoil, and it certainly hadn’t helped having Solas and Varric both pulling at him, catching him in their crossfire of words. 

Some of those words caught her, too. _Cannot change our nature. The essence of what he is._ They stirred up pangs of guilt in her stomach, though she couldn’t say why. And so when all three of them turned to her, looked to her to singlehandedly shape the destiny of another living being, irrevocably, once and for all... in the end, she decided the stakes were simply too high. She couldn’t bear to be the one who risked everything Cole was on the chance that someday he could be more.

And it was a terrible mistake.

\--

She was so relieved at first, to see him calmer, feeling safe. Solas said the amulet would protect him, keep him Compassion, no matter how their enemies might try to twist him. His simple joy at knowing that he could help without fear of being bound warmed her heart.

\--

_“You have to promise me.” Wide, wild eyes, long thin fingers clutching her sleeve. “Don’t let me be chained, changed. I am me. I have to be me.”_

_Her hand covers his, squeezing lightly, reminding him he is real. “You are Cole. I won’t let anyone change that.”_

\--

“How are you feeling, Cole?” she asked him a few days after the ritual.

He looked at her, and she felt a chill. His eyes, once so intense, had faded to a paler blue, and she swore that it took a moment for recognition to register in them. As if he’d forgotten that the name was his. 

“I am well,” he said. His tone was calm and even and reminded her of Tranquil she’d met. “Hearing, helping, healing. Lighter now, the load lifted. I don’t think about myself anymore. My _self._ It means nothing now. Isn’t it wonderful?” He smiled and it was all wrong, too simple, not _Cole._

She swallowed. “Wonderful.”

\--

She avoided him after that, as much as she could. It wasn’t difficult. He appeared and disappeared at will now, like he had at first, when no one remembered him. Every now and then she’d catch a glimpse of him—a thin figure watching from the ramparts, the wide brim of a hat disappearing around a corner—but he did his work in silence now, and she didn’t come to talk to him anymore.

\--

_“You like it up here, don’t you?” She finds him nestled in the rafters of the Rest, brings him a smile and a cup of tea. He doesn’t drink it but he likes the scent._

_His eyes slide to her and away. “I can listen here. To the songs, and the other songs, the ones you don’t know you play.”_

_She nods. “You could come down, you know. Sit with us some night. You’d be welcome.”_

_He gives her a thoughtful smile. “Maybe,” he says, seeming to surprise even himself with the word. “Maybe I will.”_

\--

“I understand your concern, Inquisitor.” Solas’ voice was as measured as ever. “Certainly to the uninitiated, the changes in Cole’s behavior must seem abrupt and alarming. But you must try to see it as the rebirth it is.”

“He’s forgetting,” she said. “Everything he felt, everything he learned. His friends. _Cole._ He says we can still call him that but soon he won’t even remember why.”

“He is a spirit,” Solas said. “Spirits are simple. They are meant to embody a single trait, not to bear the complexities of mortal emotion. It warps them, twists them. Cole would not have survived that path.”

“He was different,” she said softly. “ _Was._ ”

Solas raised an eyebrow at her. “This was _your_ choice, Inquisitor. I assure you it was the right one. I admit I suspected you’d have doubts, though.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Her anger flared.

He regarded her calmly, the slight knowing quirk of his lips making her furious for reasons she couldn’t admit to herself. “Are you worried about what he has lost, or what _you_ have lost?”

\--

_She watches him across the table all night. He wasn’t sure about joining the game, but she and Varric made a persuasive pair, and here he was, smiling and not even hiding behind his hat all that much. She felt warm, flushed with drink and happy to see him—all of them—happy._

_“Hey. I gotta_ problem,” _a slurred voice pipes up from somewhere under the table. “Why’re we letting Mr. Creepy-breeches play if he can read our bleedin’_ minds? _S’cheating!”_

_She holds her breath, watches his face. The corner of his mouth twitches. “It’s all right. I don’t understand this game,” he says mildly, innocently. “How will seeing up Josephine’s skirts help you win, Sera?”_

_The table explodes in laughter, even Josephine, though her cheeks are bright red. The corner of Cole’s mouth twitches again. She catches his eye and smiles._

\--

She tried to bury the hurt, but she knew he’d hear it eventually, so when he appeared before her in her room it was no real surprise.

“Your pain pulls at me,” he said without preamble, a slight creased frown between his eyebrows. “A flash of a smile fading, laughter so faint you can’t hear it anymore.”

“Cole, it’s nothing.” She pressed her lips together, pressed her hands together in her lap.

_“Nothing left of what he was, who he could have become.”_ He tilted his head, watching her with eyes as blue as the sky, as distant. “I am not human and it hurts you. You think I am less than I was.”

She closed her eyes.

“I am… happy,” he continued, and the light flat tone of his voice twisted something inside of her. “I help and I am happy. So simple, doesn’t hurt like it did. _A creature caught in a trap goes mad, gnaws at itself._ You set me free.”

“Don’t say that.” Her voice was flat. “Please. Go.”

He paused, spoke softly. “Would you like me to make you forget?”

_Either way, he is gone._

It took her a long time to answer.


End file.
